The second-biggest German bank, Commerzbank, is expected this week to name a new boss, Martin Blessing, to breathe new life into a group that has rebounded -- but which might soon have to fight off suitors.
The Frankfurt-based bank's supervisory council is to meet tomorrow and approve his nomination, a source close to the matter said on Friday.
The decision should not come as a surprise since Blessing has been mooted for many months as the natural successor to Klaus-Peter Mueller, the chairman.
Blessing, 44, is likely to head a younger management board that already includes financial director Eric Strutz and private banking head Achim Kassow, both of whom are also in their 40s.
In addition, the board is expected to see the arrival of Markus Beumer and Frank Annuscheit, who fall into the same age group as well.
Mueller's term does not end before 2010 but he has agreed to take on the post of supervisory board president, replacing Martin Kohlhaussen who celebrates his 72nd birthday this week.
Kohlhaussen was himself a former chairman.
According to the German daily Die Welt, Mueller's influence is likely to continue at Commerzbank.
However the newspaper suggested that Blessing's shoulders were perhaps not yet wide enough to assume the mantle from his mentor and run a bank that employs 36,000 people.
And Blessing, who would officially take over in May at a general assembly of bank shareholders, is a close aide to Mueller, who chose him in 2001 to join the board.
"A new wind and new concepts" were expected with Blessing's nomination, Mueller had said at the time.
The new board member was first assigned the task of turning around the loss-making Private Customers division before taking responsibility for Commerzbank's thriving strong small and medium-sized business unit.
Blessing was born into a family of bankers, his grandfather ran the German central bank in the 1960s and his father worked at what is now the biggest German bank, Deutsche Bank.
The younger Blessing cut his teeth working at Dresdner Bank after completing studies in in Frankfurt, St Gallen, Switzerland and Chicago.
He is to take over a Commerzbank that can now point to strong results even though it took a hit during the international banking crisis that followed the collapse of the US market for high-risk mortgages earlier this year.
Writedowns in connection with its credit commitments could be larger than expected when the bank releases third-quarter results expected tomorrow, analysts say, but earnings should increase nonetheless.
Commerzbank still anticipates a record full-year net profit.
Directors point to those results when they reiterate the bank's desire to remain an independent firm as takeover rumors swirl around it.
As a protective measure, Commerzbank swallowed the property banking group Eurohypo in 2005 to become the second-biggest private German bank.
But WestLB analyst Johannes Thormann said that might not be enough to keep all suitors at bay, especially since the bank's share price has fallen in the past months amid fears over the effects of the banking crisis.
SILICON VALLEY HUB: The office would showcase Taiwan’s strengths in semiconductors and artificial intelligence, and help Taiwanese start-ups connect with global opportunities Taiwan has established an office in Palo Alto, one of the principal cities of Silicon Valley in California, aimed at helping Taiwanese technology start-ups gain global visibility, the National Development Council said yesterday. The “Startup Island Taiwan Silicon Valley hub” at No. 299 California Avenue is focused on “supporting start-ups and innovators by providing professional consulting, co-working spaces, and community platforms,” the council said in a post on its Web site. The office is the second overseas start-up hub established by the council, after a similar site was set up in Tokyo in September last year. Representatives from Taiwanese start-ups, local businesses and
‘DETERRENT’: US national security adviser-designate Mike Waltz said that he wants to speed up deliveries of weapons purchased by Taiwan to deter threats from China US president-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for US secretary of defense, Pete Hegseth, affirmed his commitment to peace in the Taiwan Strait during his confirmation hearing in Washington on Tuesday. Hegseth called China “the most comprehensive and serious challenge to US national security” and said that he would aim to limit Beijing’s expansion in the Indo-Pacific region, Voice of America reported. He would also adhere to long-standing policies to prevent miscalculations, Hegseth added. The US Senate Armed Services Committee hearing was the first for a nominee of Trump’s incoming Cabinet, and questions mostly focused on whether he was fit for the
EXPRESSING GRATITUDE: Without its Taiwanese partners which are ‘working around the clock,’ Nvidia could not meet AI demand, CEO Jensen Huang said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and US-based artificial intelligence (AI) chip designer Nvidia Corp have partnered with each other on silicon photonics development, Nvidia founder and CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said. Speaking with reporters after he met with TSMC chairman C.C. Wei (魏哲家) in Taipei on Friday, Huang said his company was working with the world’s largest contract chipmaker on silicon photonics, but admitted it was unlikely for the cooperation to yield results any time soon, and both sides would need several years to achieve concrete outcomes. To have a stake in the silicon photonics supply chain, TSMC and
INDUSTRIAL CLUSTER: In Germany, the sector would be developed around Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s plant, and extend to Poland and the Czech Republic The Executive Yuan’s economic diplomacy task force has approved programs aimed at bolstering the nation’s chip diplomacy with Japan and European nations. The task force in its first meeting had its operational mechanism and organizational structure confirmed, with Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) the convener, and Vice Premier Cheng Li-chiun (鄭麗君) and Minister Without Portfolio Ma Yung-cheng (馬永成) the deputy conveners. Minister of Foreign Affairs Lin Chia-lung (林佳龍) would be the convener of the task force’s strategy group in charge of policy planning for economic diplomacy. The meeting was attended by the heads of the National Development Council, the Ministry of Economic Affairs, the
RSS